


gravestone smiles

by serenaii



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: M/M, Q251 Never Happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-28
Updated: 2014-02-28
Packaged: 2018-01-14 02:00:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1248493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serenaii/pseuds/serenaii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mayuzumi reconciles himself to the fact that one could never truly understand the person known as Akashi Seijuurou. And maybe that was okay.</p>
            </blockquote>





	gravestone smiles

**Author's Note:**

> written for bps' otp battle; posted so late because school's been a veritable hell-hole.  
> for the sake of this fic, let's just pretend 251 never happened.

Akashi smiles with his teeth. They are shiny, white teeth, forming a perfect line of marble gravestones. If you punched him in the mouth, your knuckles would probably crack from the pressure. Then he would most likely bite your fingers off for daring to even try and broken knuckles would be the least of your worries. It’s a sincere smile, crinkles at the eyes and checks off all the right boxes, but it looms over you like some scary-as-shit jack in the box with mirrors for eyes.

What Mayuzumi is trying to say is that one could not take such a broad concept like ‘body language’ and apply it to Akashi Seijuurou. This is a man who is not human, a man with a crown for a skull and a sceptre for a spine, and to mistake a gaze averted as a sign of weakness is to take the first step towards humiliation and crushing defeat. 

So he finds himself in a bit of a bind, really. Romance is already hard enough as it is, but when your only significant romantic partner displays rather sociopathic tendencies on his better days, the whole dating thing really can get quite messy. Thankfully, Mayuzumi has avoided stepping on anyone’s toes so far. The closest he’s ever gotten was showing up on their first date with a pot of specially-made seaweed salad thrust upon him by his mother (‘Bring a gift! You can’t go on a date without a gift! What sort of lousy son did I raise?’). Her homemade cooking looked good enough when you drenched it in enough sauce, and Akashi’s smile was as pretty and genuine as ever, but the silence was a millisecond too long and Akashi blinked at him one too many times and Mayuzumi’s pride was useless in those sort of baffling situations (thanks mom).

Looking back, he thinks that he carried himself with sufficient dignity and maturity. Chucking the contents of the pot into the neighbouring house’s azaleas still remains a rather sensible decision, even on hindsight, considering the whole done-on-impulse issue and all. And so maybe his wallet felt a great deal lighter and his ego a great deal smaller from the whole ordeal, but he doesn’t miss the fact that Akashi’s face is practically glowing throughout dinner and surely he wouldn’t bother faking _that_ if he wasn’t even a little bit pleased?

The worst thing (or the best thing) about this is that he can’t even resent this situation; being reduced to tiptoeing around Akashi as if he doesn’t already tower over him just does not feel as restrictive as it should be. But though he might not resent it, it irritates him beyond belief.

In retrospect, stomping around the court and slamming balls against the wall throughout practice to vent that irritation is one of many unbelievably bad ideas (the primary one being attending practice in the first place). Akashi corners him before he can slip off to the showers, waits until the hall is cleared out before levelling him with an appropriately steely gaze.

“If you have a problem, you can take it up with me, instead of going around like an undisciplined child,” Akashi says, in a completely matter-of-fact tone, the sort of tone that led one to understand why people committed murders.  

“Calling your senior a child is a bit rich, don’t you think?” Despite what it may seem, his tongue is firmly in between his teeth, because he’s careful when it comes to Akashi, he really is. Plus, there’s a light novel waiting for him at home, and it would be nice to have functional hands to hold it with.

Evidently, he isn’t careful enough. Akashi stares at him for a while longer, and Mayuzumi is going to snap and say something stupid along the lines of _is my face really that nice to look at?_ and then everything will truly go to hell. Before he can open his mouth, however, Akashi somehow forcibly releases the knot of tension from his shoulders. He wonders if this is what Akashi intended to look like, a deflating red rubber balloon.

“You’re angry,” Akashi says.

There is no room at the end of that statement, but he’s used to making space where there isn’t any. “About what? Your shit haircut?” 

He can see a brief spark of something in Akashi’s eyes, a bloated bubble of ~~disappointment~~ anger bursting out bright red. He cannot tell whether it’s just trick of a the light, doesn’t even have time to be angry that he can’t, and then a basketball is placed in his hands and Akashi has moved halfway across the court before he can even blink.

“Pass the ball to me.” Akashi tells him. “And I’ll shoot.”

He does not have surgical-precision-control over his facial features like some people, so he wonders if he looks sufficiently confused for Akashi’s comprehension. “Is there a point to this,” he asks, a bit irritably. “Or are you _trying_ to waste my time?”

“I’m not wasting anybody’s time.” The reply is cool, words carved from ice half-melted. “Pass the ball.”

Mayuzumi closes his eyes, thinks, _functional hands_ , and then he passes the ball and Akashi moves, runs and jumps and—

It’s a blur of red hair and moving limbs, but it’s more than that. It’s his heart sputtering to a stop and his breath catching in his throat and wind brushing across his skin, unwanted smiles and bruised toes but it’s worth it, falling falling falling, every time. Akashi’s fingers are curled around the hoop for a brief moment, then he lets go and his feet land on the floor without a sound.

He glances over at Mayuzumi, and the look of complete and utter bewilderment that he sees must agree with him somewhat, for the corners of his lips twitch slightly. He walks over, cups Mayuzumi’s face in his miracle-inducing hands and for once Mayuzumi’s mouth is open but he has nothing clever to say.

“I didn’t inform you about my meeting with my former teammates,” he says, fingers tracing his jawline with touches like whispers. “Because there are also things, between you and I, that no one else will share.”

Akashi smiles. There is no teeth, and it’s awkward and strained and doesn’t quite reach his eyes but Mayuzumi tilts his head, presses his lips to the rough skin of his palm and mouths _okay_ and _i’m sorry_ in between the lines carved into flesh and blood _;_ he still doesn’t understand Akashi Seijuurou but he’s learning to, slowly, and maybe one day he will.

Until the time comes, he’ll take any sort of smile.


End file.
